Voyager-1

[sigma]

According to the NASA probe Voyager-1 is outside the solar system, I would like to congratulate all of this significant event! For the first time in the history of the artificial device, made by human hands, went out into interstellar space, and continues its flight. Flight of humanity in the depths of the Universe.

[Spidey]

Edit...

Sorry, I should not have dragged some E&C baggage in here.

[Sergeant Thorne]

And they had to revise their criteria for what evidences an exiting of the solar system in order to come to this conclusion... what a fascinating peek at the limitations of scientific man's understanding (source CNN).

BTW I'm pretty sure I've been on this board long enough to be a "DemiGod", and I've been feeling different lately, so if it's cool I'd like a review of the criteria to make sure the board's current opinion of my rank is accurate... I have a few theories which may help.

[Pumo]

If i'm not wrong, going out of the the solar system actually means going out of the heliosphere, right?
I think that's pretty clear, or at least that's what I understand as 'leaving the solar system';
And IIRC, that was precisely what I read from the news back on August, that the Voyager-1 left the Heliosphere behind.

Anyway, it's such great news!
I'm also eagerly awaiting for the New Horizons probe to arrive at Pluto in 2015, that would let us know more about Kuiper Belt objects and Dwarf Planets in general.

[vision]

... what a fascinating peek at the limitations of scientific man's understanding.

What limitation is that?

[Duper]

If i'm not wrong, going out of the the solar system actually means going out of the heliosphere, right?
I think that's pretty clear, or at least that's what I understand as 'leaving the solar system';

Technically, I think so. but most would probably consider that after passing Pluto's orbit.

And IIRC, that was precisely what I read from the news back on August, that the Voyager-1 left the Heliosphere behind.

http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/interstellar.html

And I found this with a search:
http://science.time.com/2013/03/20/huma ... liosphere/
never the less.... I remember when this thing launched. o_0 What's amazing is that there is more computing power in your cell phone than there is on that craft.

[Pumo]

Oh, OK, thanks for clearing that up.
So what Voyager-1 crossed was the Heliopause.

Well, one way or the other, it's really great to know that it's the first human-made item to get that far from our Earth, into the interstellar environment.
It is something extremely awesome.

[sigma]

By the way, I was struck not only a photo of the Earth taken from a record distance of Voyager-1, but also Carl Sagan comment to this photo http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot

[CDN_Merlin]

By the way, I was struck not only a photo of the Earth taken from a record distance of Voyager-1, but also Carl Sagan comment to this photo http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot

I don't read Russian and sadly that site won't translate it English.

[LEON]

Also, Voyager-1 has a gold plate with inscriptions on our position, let's hope we don't invite something nasty.

[Sergeant Thorne]

By the way, I was struck not only a photo of the Earth taken from a record distance of Voyager-1, but also Carl Sagan comment to this photo http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot

I don't read Russian and sadly that site won't translate it English.

Roughly translated* it reads ...

From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known, so far, to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment, the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

That's some very elegant naval-gazing right there.

* C'mon, Merlin, all you had to do was remove the "http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot"

[sigma]

By the way, I was struck not only a photo of the Earth taken from a record distance of Voyager-1, but also Carl Sagan comment to this photo http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot

I don't read Russian and sadly that site won't translate it English.

I'm sorry. I'm a little surprised by your impracticality. In Wikipedia, there is always the left column, in which is enough to choose the desired language and the article will be automatically translated.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot

[CDN_Merlin]

I tried that and ENGLISH was greyed out.

[Tunnelcat]

Voyager 1 still has to survive the Oort Cloud, which NASA estimates it will reach in 200 to 300 years. Then it will take 30,000 years to get through that. Want to bet what it's survival rate odds will be once it enters that?

http://www.nbcnews.com/science/where-do ... 8C11142403

[vision]

Want to bet what it's survival rate odds will be once it enters that?

I bet the odds are almost identical to what they are before it reaches the cloud. The Oort is almost completely empty space. It might pick up a few microscopic dings but I doubt it will encounter a large enough piece of rock to obliterate it.

[Duper]

Here's the Rest of the Journey

[Tunnelcat]

Want to bet what it's survival rate odds will be once it enters that?

I bet the odds are almost identical to what they are before it reaches the cloud. The Oort is almost completely empty space. It might pick up a few microscopic dings but I doubt it will encounter a large enough piece of rock to obliterate it.

Well, the odds might be a little higher than in space, but probably way lower than compared to cruising through Saturn's rings. Still, whacking into a snowball comet remnant at the speeds it's traveling at will be catastrophic.

[Sirius]

The interesting part about the heliopause was mostly how they figured out how to tell that they'd crossed it with the equipment available. There was actually a decent chunk of detective work involved.

Also, at the speeds objects travel at in space, a collision with anything of even visible size can do a lot of damage. The Oort cloud would probably be very sparse, though, and if it is indeed 200-300 years away from it, the probe will be long dead by then - the RTG will only produce enough power to run any of its systems for a few more decades at best.

[sigma]

Also, Voyager-1 has a gold plate with inscriptions on our position, let's hope we don't invite something nasty.

Firstly, I believe that humanity for 40,000 years will find a way to move much faster in space. E.g., using wormholes. Much earlier than Voyager-1 will reach neighborhoods planetary system star AC +79 3888 in the direction which the probe is flying. Therefore, the threat of the information held on board the Voyager-1, in my opinion, is minimal.
Secondly, I am absolutely sure that there are many extraterrestrial civilizations like the Earth. At least for the fact that life could emerge on Earth. And the universe, as we know, consists of approximately the same chemical elements. And I'm sure that some civilizations are on the disproportionately higher level of development than mankind. Given that the age of the universe is 14 billion years old. While the age of the Earth is only 4.5 billion years old. Also, I have little doubt that the observed astronauts UFO activity in the orbit of the Earth is nothing like an extraterrestrial intelligence. If we still be not conquered by aliens, this may mean, we are of interest to them only as a form of life, but we are not a threat to them. While, of course, it may be such that it is a preliminary exploration in order to win our Earth. Although, frankly, I think that much more of a real threat to the Earth and humanity are the people themselves and asteroids, than all aliens laid end to end.

Here, a simplified map of the orbits of asteroids are guaranteed capable of destroying life on Earth.

[Tunnelcat]

Looks like Earth has much better odds of getting whacked by space rocks than Voyager-1. So who will survive into the future, Voyager, or Earth? It'd be funny if Voyager was all that was left of humanity far into the future.

[vision]

It'd be funny if Voyager was all that was left of humanity far into the future.

Actually, that's exactly what will happen. It was explained to me as a kid when I was learning about Astronomy that the probes will just keep going long after our Sun eats the Earth. They are unlikely to fall into a star or basically hit anything at all because, you know, space is almost completely empty. However, the probes will encounter specks of dust and tiny grains on their journey which will have the long term effect of "sandblasting" them into garbage. They will eventually become fast moving clouds of dust.

(I also believe Humanity will be living in the stars at that point, but we will be different than human -- we will be something else, something better. There is a chance some future archeologist will go scoop the probes up for fun, with the same curiosity as collecting Bronze Age tools today.)

[Tunnelcat]

Well, doesn't that make the gold plaque in Voyager a little pointless? It'd probably take so long to reach intelligent life elsewhere that the information would be sandblasted into a flat nothingness at the very least.

[Sirius]

It was arguably pointless to begin with; it's an incredibly small object nowhere near anything else in particular, and it's easier to tell Earth has life on it just by, you know, looking at it. I suspect that's the thing that would get spotted first.

Also, the only asteroids in the league of being able to utterly end life on earth are the very biggest, and even then it'd be a long-shot now. Some microorganisms are incredibly resilient, and if you don't evaporate all the water and heat the crust up well past boiling point, it's not going to be enough. The sun is forecast to do that within a few billion years, but until then, most likely something will be left behind.

Destroying civilization? That's a bit easier - but as I've said before, it's still probably more resilient than we give it credit for.

[vision]

Well, doesn't that make the gold plaque in Voyager a little pointless?

Well yeah, but there is context to think about. Space travel is romantic and it's still completely amazing we can even do these things. Sagan was responsible for the gold record and he was a tremendous popularizer of science. Voyager was just going "out there" to explore our neighborhood and they were not aiming the probes at any place in particular where life might be. The hope was that if by some remarkably slim chance someone found the thing they could find us and make contact. But I believe within a few thousand years we will be able reach other stars -- long before Voyager every gets close to one.

[Pumo]

...it's not going to be enough...
Destroying civilization? That's a bit easier - but as I've said before, it's still probably more resilient than we give it credit for.

Totally agree, those are exactly my thoughts.

Even erasing the humanity would be a bit more easier (although it still tougher than it seems, as Sirius said) than totally erasing life.

As Dr. Ian Malcolm from Jurassic Park said: 'Life finds a way', at least until the sun engulfs the earth or other really big incident (Near Supernova, Hypernova, etc.) happens.
And even then, sometimes there are surprises (i.e. bacteria or stuff like that traveling through remnant dust left from the earth? who knows.)

[Duper]

Well, we'll be dealing with it later, I'm sure. Here's PROOF from the internetz



(VGER)

[Isaac]

It will be funny when we have tech that allows us to quickly catch up to Voyager-1.